Dry Creek Overlook

[dragonmaster42]

Thought I'd share a few pics I took around the place of the future/developing wine garden, hopyard, and thanks to rrawhide syrah/ merlot vineyard that I decided to call Dry Creek Overlook. The place is mostly a steep hill and trees about 4 miles west of Waldo in Benton, AR. There's a pretty good size sunny patch I'm taking advantage of and have a chainsaw that I can make more with.


Looking down the back couple acres at Dry Creek from the upstairs porch. Yes, it's mostly trees this time of year, but there really is a creek down there.

One of a dozen or so Syrah cuttings. They've been in the ground just undera month now, planting was delayed by the 20" of rain we got in May. Haven't done the trellis yet or adrip line for watering.

One of about 20 Merlot cuttings:

Hop vines on an experimental low trellis system. They're 11 ft high with a 4' cross at the top (all PVC) with 2 vines per string. The two that are going strong are Cascade (first pic) and Willamette (second pic). There's also a Magnum and Kent Golding which only have a couple vines on them.

Here you can see the trellis system better. I planted a Saaz rhizome one one of them to try out but it never came up.Might try another one next year. Most of the other green stuff visible is weeds and the corner of the raspberry patch (the tall stuff in the bottom left). This was taken before I cleared the rows for the grape cuttings.

Planted a small patch of red, black and whitecurrants this year, 3 of each. Here's one of the black currants. One reds didn't make it and one black ones got weed whacked by mistake. It's coming back strong though.

Also put in a raspberry patch. Seems to be devoping awhite cottony looking fungus(?) on it that's been killing back some of the vines so I need to spray them.

Also plantedthis spring were some sweet and tart cherry trees and 5 chokecherry trees. A deer has found the cherry trees though, so not sure how those will fair. All but one has been completely deleafed at least once, most of them twice.... Come this fall, he better watch out!!


Tony

 

[Waldo]

What a view that will be in the future. My vines I got from JW are doing good so far. I jut hope they continue doing so

 

[grapeman]

You really do have a lot going on there in that little patch in the woods. It must be hard beating back all the vegetation. I can see why you had one victim of the weed whacker and more with the deer. I can't wait to see more.

 

[gaudet]

Dragonmaster,

That deer better look out, otherwise, he'll become your silent partner in the Dry Creek Outlook Winery's subdivision The Dry Creek Outlook Venison Sausage Co.

Mmm Mmm that does sound good already.

 

[dragonmaster42]

mmmmmmmm.... venison! It's what's going to be for supper!!

 

[R Ziegler]

hey dragonmaster42,
I lived near Bentonville, AR for a few years and found there are a number of wineries east of Fort Smith and that they were very helpful w/ questions I had when going there for tasting and other events.


The wineries are as follows:





Altus , Chateau Aux Arc, (pronounced "ozark") ,Mount Bethel Winery, Post Familie Vineyards & Winery, Wiederkehr Wine Cellars and Vineyard






Also, you might want to try growing some Cynthia/Norton - I haev heard it makes pretty good wine and it is a native grapevine of the US. I was going to try it myself, but it is much to cold for it to survive the wintershere in Central MN.



BTW - Venison goes great w/ wine

 

[Travisty]

dragonmaster, that view is incredible! Even better when your own vineyard is in it I'm sure! Good luck and enjoy the venison!

 

[dragonmaster42]

Here's a more recent picture after a couple days of pulling weeds. They were getting ahead of me quickly! The pile behind the 5 gallon bucket in the background are the weeds that got pulled out....
It's difficult to see, but there's 3 rows (above the row of beans at the bottom right) each ending at a hop vine post. Each has 7 or 8 grape vines in them. All but a half dozen or so of the cuttings are growing. About time for the trellises and a heavy layer of mulch around everything now that it's cleaned up.

Found this little box turtle crawling around in the weeds, too. Better than finding a snake! One of many critters out here in the back woods.

 

[rrawhide]

Wow DM42 - looks like a lot of fun and work to be coming down the pike. I'm glad that the grape vines are growing nicely. Lookin' good.


Thanx again for the 'care package' today - love the 'overlook' labels too.How about that '03 Burgandy? Need help on the first 2 words tho - how do you say?


Anyway, thanx again


rrawhide

 

[AlFulchino]

looking good....you reminded me of two things..i am due to start going thru the vine yard as my barber called it and pull the weeds that escaped the round up..they tend to be near a trunk

and you also reminded me that i have seen some turtle eggs this year right in the sandiest of areas in the vine yard...i almost cultivated them up one day but some earlier rain had uncovered one enough for me to see from ole johnny deere...always a fun job...hope you enjoy it more than i do

 

[dragonmaster42]

Al - can't say I enjoy pulling the weeds, but they seem to grow faster than everything else at times. The growing area is borderline being too small to use roundup (except carefully in certain places) and the weedeater and too big to pull everything by hand.


Rick - If I remember correctly, it's Wodens Daeg - which isthe old english of Odin's Day (or Woden's Day) which is the origin of our "Wednesday". Forgot who did the painting, but it is of the Norse god Odin and I bottled it on a Wednesday, so that's where it all came from.


I'd be interested in seeing what you think of it. It was a concentrate that I over oaked accidentally and really didn't like for a couple years. The past few bottles I've had have mellowed out quite a bit though. One of my early experiments.

 

[grapeman]

I just love pulling weeds so much I do it by hand whenever I get a chance!

Actually I have been on weed patrol the last couple days among other things. I pulled enough Galinsoga today to bury your vineyard 3 feet deep. It is the worst stuff on me since I am highly allergic to it. When I got done I took a shower and a Benadryl and am sneezing my head off! It forms a solid mass of weeds and grows about 2 feet tall. YUCK!!!

Your vineyard looks great being nice a weed free. Did you throw that rack of venison on the barbeque yet?

 

[dragonmaster42]

Sounds like nasty stuff Appleman.






Haven't seen that deer around lately and several of the cherry trees are showing the appearance ofrecovering so maybe it's moved on (or the local dog packs scared it off). I think two are goners and one is a maybe. These three trees were completely deleafed at least twice.

 

[grapeman]

I hope they come back for you- the trees that is not the deer.

 

[dragonmaster42]

Me too. Well, the deer is invited back later this year when deer season opens

When would be a good time to start trimming the multiple vines that are on some of the cuttings down to a single one? Wasn't sure if I should wait and let them get bigger so the roots get more established or not.

 

[grapeman]

Let them grow the first year and trim back to a couple buds on a single stem (cane) at that time. This allows the roots to get a larger food store for winter and prepare for better growth next year.

 

[dragonmaster42]

Since things are turning green and growing, thought I'd share a few pics.

Here are the rooted merlot and syrah cuttings from rrawhide that I planted in Spring 2009. I'll need to move a few to a new row to increase the space between them next year but wanted to see what survived last winter first. Pretty much all but 2 or 3 came back.

Hard to see, but here are some of the elderberries put in a couple months ago. Still small, but growing.

The aroma hops are growing well and the bittering hops aren't (haven't figured out why). The big two in this pic are Cascades and the smaller one in front is a Magnum (one of the bittering hops). The empty one in the very front actually has one small Nugget vine (another bittering hop) and will probably be replaced next year. It didn't do much of anything last year either. The other aroma hop (Kent Golding) you can just see in the left side of the pic of the grape vines and is rivaling the Cascades in growth.

Only two of the tart cherry trees survived the deer (4 were eaten). They're in the picture above, down the hill behind the hops - one on the left side of the pic and one (out of focus) on the right side. The others I replaced - one tart and three sweet - and are okay so far. We'll see what happens.

5 of the chokecherry trees planted last year survived. Still small, but they weren't much more than little twigs to begin with. Here's one of them:

Tony

 

[Runningwolf]

Tony, thanks for the update, I love the pictures. As mike said in another post it is a continuing education for some of us!

 

[grapeman]

It is always good to see things greening up. Good luck with all of them.

 

[gaudet]

Were the deer in turn eaten as well Tony?